Religious Affections

A scripture passage this morning is found in the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 22.

Matthew 22 · chapter mention

I will be reading verses 34 through 40.

I'd encourage you to turn there.

And if you are here this morning and you don't have a Bible with you, there should be a Pew Bible located in front of you.

And you can find the scripture passage on page 828.

And I'd encourage you to look on.

We're going to be looking at a variety of passages this morning.

But uh beginning there in Matthew.

And I do want to remind you, if you're here this morning and you don't own a copy of the Bible yourself, that pew Bible that you're holding, please take it home with you as our gift to you.

We want you to have it to read for yourself and to study.

And so please, as our gift, uh take that home.

Matthew chapter 22, beginning in verse 34.

Matthew 22 · chapter mention

But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together.

And one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him.

Teacher, which is the greatest commandment in the law?

And he said to him, You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.

This is the great and first commandment, and a second like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself.

On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.

As we begin this new year, I wanted to talk and in some ways continue what we were discussing over the last four or five weeks and bring it to a conclusion with some practical application of thinking about being in the presence of God, of beholding God, of uh seeking after God, of longing for God, of having a passion for God, a desire for God.

And oftentimes when I'm thinking about those things, this verse or these verses come to mind of you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, with all your strength, with all your mind.

The totality of who we are is to love God.

And as I think about it, I'm constantly reminded of the fact that I don't do that.

That I fall short of fully loving God as I'm called to do.

And I think if we're honest, all of us would recognize that none of us loves God to the degree that we are called to.

And in this life, we struggle because we're still surrounded in this fallen world and we still struggle with the inner reality of sin and temptation in our own lives for competing passions, competing goals.

And yet I do believe that even though in this life we do not fully love God, that it is our call and it is possible to sincerely and genuinely love God.

And we we struggle with that.

And I want to talk this morning about this passion, this focus for loving God, of meditating upon Him, of being in His presence.

We're reminded of the reality that we live in a fallen world, and because of that, and we've talked about this over the last five Sundays now, that there is, in a sense, this separation that has occurred.

Habakkuk reminds us that God is of pure eyes to see evil and cannot look at wrong.

And there is this separation that we sense, that uh that we are not, things are not as they should be.

And uh Paul tells us that we look through a glass dimly.

He says, For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then in the future, when we stand in the presence of God in a glorified state, we will see him face to face.

He says, Now I know in part, then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.

So we wrestle and we struggle with this reality that right now we long for God, and yet there is a sense in which uh we continue to long.

And I'm reminded of a couple Old Testament passages, and I want us to read them together.

They're in in Psalms.

Psalm 42.

In fact, this Psalm in Psalm 42, I think there, I know there were some choruses a few years back that were written on this psalm, and what has struck me about it is I think at least one of the choruses that I think of misses the point of what uh the psalmist is saying here in Psalm 42.

Psalm 42, verses 1 through 4, and let me uh read it, and you might be familiar with the chorus I'm referencing.

Psalms 42:1–4

Uh Psalm 42 says, As a deer pants for flowing streams, so pants my soul for you, O God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

When shall I come and appear before God?

My tears have been my food day and night, while they say to me all the day long, Where is your God?

These things I remember as I pour out my soul, how he would go with the throng and lead them in procession to the house of God, with glad shouts and songs of praise, a multitude keeping festival.

Let me stop there and make some comments about what the psalmist if you're thinking about what we just read, the picture that the psalmist has, he says, as a deer pants for flowing waters.

But but the picture is that the the deer is in drought.

The deer is looking for and longing for water and can't find it.

The deer is is longing for, there is a longing for, there is a desire that's there, this passionate desire, but the desire is at the moment unquenched.

So this longing, this pursuit, this desire for God, he says, My soul thirsts for God for the living God.

When shall I come and appear before God?

And he's he's in a sense uh in a wilderness, not just literally, but but spiritually in a wilderness longing for the presence of God.

I think of the Psalm 63 as well, when David was in the wilderness.

It says in the in the title in Psalm 63, and David is in exile, uh, either when he's being hunted by Saul, or most likely later when he fled from his own son Absalom.

But David writes here, he says, O God, you are my God.

Earnestly I seek you, my soul thirsts for you, my flesh faints for you, as in a dry and weary land where there is no water.

So I have looked upon you in the sanctuary, beholding your power and glory, because your steadfast love is better than life, my lips will praise you.

So I will bless you as long as I live, and your name I will lift up my hands, my soul will be satisfied as with fat and rich food, and my mouth will praise you with joyful lips.

When I remember you upon my bed and meditate you in the watches of the night, for you have been my help, and in the shadow of your wings I will sing for joy.

My soul clings to you, your right hand upholds me.

David here expresses this reality that not only literally is he in the wilderness away from the place where he worships, but but spiritually he senses this longing for God, this desire for God that he has.

I think of another passage in the Psalms of Psalm 27 in verse 4.

In in Psalm 27, he's he's writing, and uh he's uh in 27, 4, he's uh he says this.

He says, One thing I have asked of the Lord, and that will I seek after, that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in his temple.

What strikes me about these passages is well, the reality, first of all, of the longing that the psalmist has, the longing that David has for God, and and he longs for God, he desires to be with God, he desires to worship God in fullness, and that he is passionate for God, that this is this is the one thing that he pursues is God.

And I think for us as Christians, in this side of the cross, and we're gonna talk about this as we continue on looking at this theme, but in this side of the cross, how much more our longing and passion should be for God, even than what David had in his experience of God.

That here is David in his understanding and the progression of revelation of where he is in redemptive history and his understanding of who God is and the outworking of God's plan, and yet he longs and he is passionate, he desires God.

It is the one thing that he seeks, it's the one thing that will quench his thirst.

It is the one thing that will satisfy his soul, it is the one thing that will give him peace and rest.

And I think we who have a fuller understanding of God's plan, who have come under the hearing of the gospel, have come to faith in Christ, who have the indwelling Holy Spirit and power living within us.

How much more ought we to long for the fellowship of God?

I was thinking about that a couple weeks ago when I read the quote by R.

C.

Sproul and talking about when faith will be sight.

Uh, that there is coming a day, and I'll explain that in a minute, but there is coming a day when we will finally, with unveiled faces, see God.

And theologians refer to this as the blessed vision or uh the beatific vision when we will see God face to face.

And in that description, uh the theologian and Pastor R.

C.

Sproley wrote this.

He says, in the enjoyment of this beautiful vision, this beatific vision, the soul finally reaches the goal of its supreme quest.

This is the end of what we are pursuing right now.

This is the goal that we're pursuing.

He says, at last we enter into the haven where we find our peace and our rest.

The end of restlessness is reached.

The warfare between flesh and spirit ends.

Peace that transcends anything in this world fills the heart.

We reach the heights of excellency, sweetness only dreamed of in this mortal flesh.

We shall see him as he is.

No veil, no shield with no shield will hide his face.

The immediate and direct vision will flood the soul from the wellspring on high.

The highest joy, the greatest pleasure, the purest delight will be ours without mixture and without end.

That is the goal of the Christian life.

What is it that we live for?

What is it that is our desire?

What is it for which God rescued us from sin and saved us?

What is the trajectory of this journey that we're on?

It is to behold the face of God.

Sprill continues, he says, Our taste of the felicity will erase all painful memories and heal each dreadful wound incurred in this veil of tears.

No scar will remain, the pilgrim's progress will be complete, the body of death, the burden of sin will vaporize the moment we behold his face.

Our goal is to be with God forever, to behold the beauty of his holiness.

And that is the trajectory in which we are on.

I want to talk a bit about the aim and then conclude with a challenge of what we are to do in the process, in the meantime, as we're moving in that direction.

How does that impact us now?

How does that influence and inform how we live our lives right here and now?

What is it about this goal that ought to tell us what it is that we should do, what priorities we ought to have, how we ought to live our lives, the decisions we ought to make as we move forward in the Christian life.

And I think about this because in this new year, as we're in the first week of this new year and everyone makes new year's resolutions, and I do as well, I think it's a good time to reflect and look back, to see where you've been, to see where you are, to see where you're going, but to challenge us to do that in light of eternity.

The glory of God with unveiled face and the ever-in-increasing glory in the Christian life as we move towards this end.

A few weeks ago, I asked the question: what are you waiting for?

What are we waiting for?

What is our goal?

What is our ultimate hope?

What is it that we're living for?

And there are a lot of mile markers along the way.

Um, you know, the the one thing in some states, and and I if I'm if I understand correctly, North Dakota is that way as well, is that the off-ramps are based on the mile markers.

Is that correct?

I know.

Some states it's not, and it always throws me that you can be driving along and it just makes no sense.

But but but a mile marker tells us that we're on our way to our goal.

But those mile markers aren't the destination.

And as great as it is to recognize that the goal is still ahead of us, those mile markers encourage us and remind us.

And I think about that in terms of end time theology, in terms of eschatology, which is the study of end times theology.

And there are mile markers along the way, but we need to be careful to not make those our goals.

Because those are our the it's not the ultimate goal for which we were created and for which we are moving towards.

And we talk about in uh in the study of end times the rapture of this being uh whisked away from the reality of this sinful world as God is fulfilling his plan in this created order and bringing judgment upon uh unbelievers.

And we long for that.

We long to be with God.

And as great as that is, and as the reality of the truth of that in God's word, that is not our ultimate goal.

And sometimes when you talk with people, uh we think that that is the final conclusion of it, but that is really just a mile marker.

It isn't the end.

We talk about and we look at the millennium and we look at at God uh establishing and fulfilling the promises that he made to his people and the visible reign of Christ on earth and the throne of David.

And as glorious and spectacular as that is, that is not our goal either.

The reality of it is, is that when you study Revelation chapter 20, you realize that that sin, although it is not uh outwardly manifested in the visible reign of Christ, you realize that there are still those who do not bow their heads and hearts to Christ because at the end of that time there's a rebellion.

Revelation 20 · chapter mention

Sin has yet to be fully dealt with in the millennium.

And so we recognize that as we look forward to that and God's working out his plan.

But that is not our ultimate goal.

It's not until we turn the pages to Revelation chapter 21 and 22 when we see the new heaven and the new earth, that this heaven and this earth pass away, it says, the first heaven and the first earth pass away.

Revelation 21 · chapter mention

And then God creates, recreates, as it were, a new heaven and a new earth.

And that that is the place where we will dwell forever.

Even when we talk about the resurrection of the dead and the rapture of believers, when we receive our glorified bodies, we receive these new bodies that are like Christ's resurrected body.

That these bodies are transformed into something new so that uh they are without corruption and without sin, and it's eternal.

Jesus to his disciples told them that he was going to go away, but he said that I go to prepare a place for you, and if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself, where I am, there you may be also.

And so when you look at Revelation 21 and 22, that we we begin to see a glimpse of the reality of the glory for which we are moving towards.

And that ought to inform us, and it ought to motivate us, it ought to inspire us, it ought to challenge us in the decisions that we make each day of our lives right here and now.

That we ought to live our lives in light of eternity, we ought to live our lives in light of the goal for which uh God has uh created us and the purpose for which God has uh has made uh this created order.

And let me just point out a few verses in the beginning of Revelation 21, and then I want to get to some practical application uh in the rest of this message.

In Revelation 21, John writes, Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth have passed away, and the sea was no more.

And I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride, adorned for her husband.

And I heard a loud voice from the throne of God saying, Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man.

He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God.

If you've been following these past several weeks, or uh as you've read through your Bible in times past, uh the reality of what is said in verse 3 ought to grip us.

We saw this separation when Adam and Eve, when they sinned, they were cast out of Eden.

But more than that, in a very real sense, there was a spiritual separation that occurred, and they were out of the presence of God in this manifest sense that there was a separation between God and man that occurred when our first parents sinned.

And that reality, in greater measure or in decreasing measure, has been the reality from that point moving forward even now.

And so that is why Paul can say that we we look through a mirror dimly, we look through a glass dimly, because we we long to be in the presence of God, we long to experience the fullness of God in our lives, and yet we recognize that it's a fleeting reality, that we long for it, we long for it.

And at moments we experience it, and yet it is not a constant, steady state in our lives.

But there is coming a day when we will dwell in the full and complete presence of God.

This is the ultimate goal of the gospel.

If somebody wants to know, well, what is it all about?

What is the whole the whole Christian life about, and what is the gospel about?

What is the end for which the gospel saves us?

It is so that we can be forgiven, so that we can be redeemed, that we are justified before God, that we are adopted into his family, so that ultimately we will be glorified and have a glorified body and stand in the presence of God and dwell in his presence.

For all of eternity.

And we ought to long for that day.

That there's coming this day when faith will be sight, that there will be no more sickness and sadness and sin and separation.

There will be no more death.

Every tear, it says in verse 4, he will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more.

Neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain anymore.

For the former things have passed away.

There are depths of the reality, but we do know in part.

God has revealed to us the reality of what it means to be in his presence.

And I think there are glimpses of some of this reality.

We'll have resurrected, glorified physical bodies.

A lot of times when I talk to people, they think that once we die and our body goes in the grave and our soul goes to be with God in heaven, that that's it.

And that we are disembodied spirits for all of eternity.

But that's not the goal that God has for us.

That God created us to be both body and soul, to be both a material and a spiritual being simultaneously.

And so that death is an unnatural state.

To die and our bodies to go into the grave is not a natural state for how God created us to be.

And so in the resurrection, we have physical bodies like our bodies now.

And we will be in a physical location that we will experience for us that we will experience time.

In fact, the Revelation 21 talks about that and talks about months, and there's a succession of time.

We are finite beings created in space and in time, and we're going to experience continued duration moving forward.

The hymn where time will be no more is a constant reality for God, but not for us, because we are finite beings, and so we will experience events ongoing.

But in heaven, we will have, in this new heaven and new earth, where heaven and earth are joined together.

That is the spiritual reality, the physical reality of the new creation, that we will live in a physical place that Christ has prepared, is even now preparing a place for us that will be revealed at that time, that we will have relationships with all of the other redeemed saints, that we will be in relationship with one another, that we will have things to do, that we will have work.

Work is not a part of the fall.

The toil and labor of work is, but work itself was not a product of the fall.

Adam was put in the garden prior to sin entering into the created order.

It will enjoy the beauty of this new creation.

In fact, in Randy Elkorn's book, and he does a great job of describing and fleshing out some of the reality of what it means to be in heaven.

But the fact is that in some ways, heaven will be the superlative of all of the good things that we experience here and now on earth without any sin, without any of the of the tinge of fallenness that we experience now.

But the greatest reality in all of that is we will behold the face of God.

So how ought that to affect us now?

If that is our ultimate goal, how ought that to affect us now?

How should we live in light of eternity?

Well, let me share a couple uh other verses with you.

Colossians chapter 3.

Colossians 3 · chapter mention

Colossians chapter 3, beginning in verse 1.

Colossians 3 · chapter mention

Paul writing there, he says, if then you have been raised with Christ, and he's presuming that you as a believer have been raised with Christ in newness of life, in your union with Christ, you have been joined with Christ, you've been raised with Christ, he says, seek the things that are above.

If you've been raised with Christ, if you know Christ, if you are in union with Christ, have a relationship with him, seek the things that are above.

Where Christ is seated at the right hand of God.

Set your mind on the things that are above, not on the things that are on earth, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

Now, there's a spiritual reality here that we don't often grasp, but that uh that even now, when we when we came to faith in Christ, we've been united with Christ in his death and resurrection, and that in one sense, because we've been united with Christ, and Christ has been raised and in his session is seated at the right hand of the Father, that we too, uh in one sense, uh are seated at the right hand of God, that we are with Christ in the heavenlies, even though we are still here and now in the earth, but there is a spiritual reality that we have with our union with Christ.

For he says, For you have died, verse 3, for you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.

And then he says, When Christ, who is your life, appears.

When Christ, who is your life, now think about that phrase for a second.

Christ is your life.

Can we say that?

Of course we can spiritually, but as we look at how we live our lives, do we live our lives as if this reality is played out every day that Christ is my life, he is my goal, he is the one for whom I do all things.

He is the reason for my existence, my desire to glorify him.

Christ is my life.

When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.

So, how do we live in light of eternity?

Well, I've heard it said of people.

Well, some people are so heavenly minded that they're no earthly good.

Well, I've never actually seen that.

I have met a lot of people in life who are so earthly minded that they're no heavenly good.

But I have met very few people who are in the right way heavenly minded, in the way that God calls us to be heavenly minded, who are no earthly good, the people who I know who are most in the right sense of what God calls us to be, to focus on him and glorify him and live for him and love him and love people who are the most heavenly minded are the most earthly good.

Because they're the ones who have their priorities in order.

They're the ones who are living not just for themselves and not for earthly gain.

They're the ones who are living for what matters most.

They're the ones that put people over possessions, they're the ones who are willing to give of their time, talent, and energy and effort.

They're the ones who are willing to serve selflessly because they know their reward is not here and now.

They know it's in heaven.

And so it's as I as I hear that, and people say, Well, people are, you know, I know some who are so heavenly minded they're no earthly good.

I don't know what that looks like.

I've never seen it.

I know people who take things out of balance, who take things out of context, who, because of their own personal difficulties or or or emotional challenges in a wrong and unbalanced way, um do things, but but but people who take the call of Christ and who who seek God and apply the gospel in their lives, who are seeking first the things of God, who are setting their minds on the things above, they're the most practical people that I know.

And they're the most influential people that I know.

And the ones who are making the most eternal difference that I know.

I've known many people who were so earthly minded that they were no heavenly good.

We're called to love God with all of our heart, mind, soul, and strength, to have uh this passion for God.

We're called to love God with the totality of who we are.

The reformers used to uh talk about, there was a Latin phrase that was uh that was used, corumdeo.

And I've mentioned this before, but all it means is before the face of God or living in the presence of God.

Now, I want to take what our goal is and apply it now.

Just think with me for a few minutes.

In heaven, our goal is to be in the presence of God in fullness.

Now, right now, we don't yet experience the full reality of that, but we are in a very real sense in the presence of God.

God is everywhere.

God is everywhere, so he is here.

He is with me every moment of my life, both in the indwelling Holy Spirit and in the essence of his attributes, being omnipresent.

He is everywhere.

And so there is not a moment of my life that I am outside of the presence of God.

I am always in the presence of God.

I am always before God.

God always beholds me.

There is never a time, there is never a moment when I am not in the presence of God.

I may not realize that, I may not be conscious of it, I may not be aware of it, I may ignore it, but that doesn't change the reality that my whole life is lived before the face of God.

It is lived quorum deo, it is lived in God's presence.

That being the case, how ought we to live?

This is why Jesus said in Matthew 6.33, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

The passionate pursuit of our hearts and our lives ought to be for God and his glory and the advancement of his kingdom, because we know what the end is.

To tie all of this together.

But here in in 2 Corinthians chapter 3, beginning in verse 16, he says, But when one turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.

2 Corinthians 3 · chapter mention

And he's talking about the hardness of heart and the old uh with those who who don't know Christ and and comparing the old covenant with the new covenant, and and he says that there is this veil, and when somebody comes to Christ, it's as if this veil is lifted.

That uh that that uh that the Holy Spirit uh brings conversion, turning away from self-righteousness, turning to Christ.

Uh that the Holy Spirit works in our lives, that this veil is removed.

And so uh there is this conversion that occurs in coming to Christ.

In verse 17, uh he talks about this liberation.

He says, now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.

We're freed from the penalty of sin in Christ.

The judgment of God that we are uh children of wrath as unbelievers is removed from us when we come to Christ, that there's therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

The penalty for sin has been paid for fully by Christ.

But in addition to that, the enslaving bondage to sin is lifted, that we no longer are under obligation to obey the flesh, Paul says in Romans chapter 8, verse 12.

Romans 8:12

And so there is freedom that we have, there is liberation.

But then also there is transformation in verse 18.

And I want us to think about this in light of eternity and what we're called to now.

And look at what he says in verse 18.

And we all, all of us, all believers now, all those who have faith in Christ, he says, and we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another.

For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.

Um let me back up for one moment and explain something that um things in our lives can become idols.

Uh idolatry isn't just in the Old Testament when they would make carved wooden images.

Things in our lives can become idols, but not necessarily so.

Good things uh can be enjoyed uh as we recognize the giver of that gift of what uh God has given us.

And so we can enjoy the good things that God has given us.

But our focus always needs to remain on God.

But notice what it says here, and I want to close with this.

He says that beholding the glory of the Lord, in one sense, when we came to Christ, the veil was lifted.

Now, in the fullest sense, we still long for that, but in a real sense, in a genuine sense, we now are able to see God, even though it's through a glass dimly.

But we're being transformed as we behold the glory of God, as we look to Christ, we're being transformed into that same image.

So, what is the purpose of the Christian life?

The purpose of the Christian life is to long for God, to behold God, knowing that that is our goal.

And so now in this life, we passionately pursue God.

And as we do, and as we long for God, to live for God, to love God, to behold God, in that very process of doing that, there is a transformational work because we become like the one whom we worship.

And so it comes full circle that we live before the face of God, we live before the audience of one, we behold his glory, we long for it more and more, and that ought to be if there's one goal that we have for this new year, is to passionately pursue God like never before.

And to say, I'm gonna forget what is behind, but I'm going to press on to passionately pursue God in this new year above all else.

To dwell in his presence for his glory.

And to realize as we do that, in that very process of pursuing God, of being passionate for God, there's a transformational work.

And as we behold the glory of the Lord, we are being transformed into that same glory.

And we long for that day when faith will be safe, when the trumpet sounds and the dead in Christ are raised, and we who are alive will be transformed, and we will finally have the full reality of what we live for now and what we long for in our lives.

Let's pray.

Father, as we uh come to a conclusion of this message, we pray that you will stir our hearts and minds through your word to pursue you, to seek you, to be passionate for you, to long for you, to desire you.

Father, that we will not be sidetracked and dissuaded from this singular pursuit of you above all else.

And so, Father, I pray for us in this new year that this will be our goal, not just now, not just this week, not just this year, but the remainder of our lives.

And we look forward to and we long for that day when faith will be sight.

We pray in Christ's name.

Amen.